Hero
by jayer
Summary: Mac faces a matter that feels very close to home. Post Run Silent.
1. Prologue

Mac took a deep breath. There was a part of him that wanted to scream. To punch something. He had been holding it in for hours. Ever since Danny had walked in his office, personally bringing him the report that had made Danny look like a killer.

He hadn't lied when he told Danny that he believed the story. He did believe it. Just like he believed when Danny swore that he never heard that undercover cop identify himself. Mac could understand how in the chaos Danny might have thought the cop was walking out of the same spot as the shooter. How he couldn't hear the yells from the other end of the platform with all the yelling and running going on.

He knew Danny was a good person and a good cop. But he also knew that innocent people sometimes paid for the crimes of others.

But not this time. This time, the guilty party was going to be brought to justice. The fact that it was that punk Sonny Sassone with his attitude and his veiled threats against Danny that was guilty only made it sweeter. Mac was not a man to seek revenge, but he would always take great delight in bringing someone like Sonny down. Sonny had two certain deaths to pay for and, Mac feared, a third one would soon be on the list.

Mac paused outside the door. He straightened his tie and ran his fingers through his hair. He wasn't a vain man, but he couldn't let Sonny see him even the slightest ruffled. He couldn't let Sonny see that he'd been hours without sleep, that he was sick with concern for how one of his men, one of his friends, was handling the possibility of losing a loved one. He had to match attitude with attitude of he was going to get to Sonny.

And he was going to get Sonny.


	2. A friend in need

An hour later, Mac was driving to the hospital. He pulled into a space and hurried down the sidewalk.

He didn't expect to see Danny standing outside. Flack had been calling him every half hour with updates. Mac knew it was bad, very bad. But he was still not prepared to see Danny looking so deflated. It was like all the strength was just draining out of him and it was all he could do to keep it together. It was so unlike the teasing young man that would make bets on teammates eating roasted bugs, challenged the local fire boys to hoops or street hockey, who sometimes got himself in trouble when his burning desire for justice for the forgotten made him too stubborn to back down when he should.

"Hey." He said softly as he approached.

"Hey." Danny said with a sigh.

Up close he looked worse. Without his glasses on, it was easier to see the bloodshot eyes, the circles.

"How's your brother?"

Danny didn't say anything. He just shook his head. He leaned back against the wall like it was the only thing holding him up.

"Lindsay told me you listened to the tape. We did everything we could forensically but in the end, it was Louie that saved you."

Danny looked at him. The face wasn't unlike after the shooting in the subway, hearing the words making the truth sink in like a knife. Only this time, there were tears welling up in Danny's eyes. He nodded, trying to speak but the words caught in his throat.

"You okay?"

"They beat my brother pretty bad. They --" Danny started sobbing, forgetting all the rules about Bronx Boys being tough and never letting anything out. It was like a dam breaking. "They beat him really bad, Mac."

Mac reached out and pulled Danny to him. He could think of no words to say in that moment. He just held Danny. One hand gently on his neck, the other on his back. He stood there, not giving a damn what was going on around them while Danny sobbed in his arms.

After several minutes, he could feel the sobbing slow. Danny pushed away softly, wiping his eyes with his hand. Neither of them said a word. They just stood, leaning against the wall, in silence. Staring at the stars.

The silence was broken by a clatter of footsteps walking towards them.

"Danny."

"Mommy." Danny greeted the woman, who enveloped him in a hug. Danny's mother was a petite woman -- Danny had to lean down a bit to hug her -- of noticeably Italian stock and quite the beauty. And it was clear from seeing the two of them side by side where Danny got the handsome looks that made all the women in the lab check him out the first time they saw him.

"Mr Messer."

"We came as fast as we could." Danny's father pulled him to one side. "How is Louie?"

"I haven't seen him, but I understand that he's in very bad shape."

"Thank you for taking care of Danny." Mrs Messer kept one arm around Danny as she spoke to him.

"Of course." Mac nodded. "I'd like to stay for a little while. If that's alright."

Danny's parents looked to him to an answer. He nodded at Mac.

"Then, why don't you take your parents to see Louie and I'll get us some coffee. And maybe some sandwiches?"

"Sure. Thanks Mac." Something in his voice told Mac it wasn't about the food.

"Anytime, Danny. Anytime."


	3. The waiting game

Mac entered the ICU waiting room to find Danny and his mother sitting on one of the couches. Danny, clearly exhausted, had his head resting on his mother's shoulder. She was singing something in Italian. Mac set the bags of food and coffee on the table next to Mrs Messer. He pulled two cups of coffee out of the bags and left the rest, knowing that Mrs Messer would insist that her son eat, which was exactly what Mac was counting on.

He walked over to the window where Mr Messer was watching a nurse taking Louie's vitals.

"Thank you, Detective." He took the cup Mac held out, but didn't bother to drink. He glanced over at his son and wife. "Perhaps we could take a walk."

"Sure."

They walked in silence for a several minutes. Mac let Danny's father take the lead. In walking and talking. The gravity of the situation was sinking in. And Mac all too well understood how that felt.

They paused outside the nursery.

"I met Sophie working in her father's bakery." Mr Messer said, watching the activity in the nursery with a faint smile. "She was a beauty. So much that I couldn't believe it when she feel in love with me. We married just a month after Sophie finished high school. Louie was our first anniversary present.

"Barely six months later, Sophie was pregnant again. Only she lost the baby two months later. She lost three more after that. Two miscarriages, one still born. It was like God wanted us to only have one child.

"And then, almost four years later, Sophie was pregnant again."

"Danny?"

"Yeah. He was born six weeks early. Scrawny. But he was stubborn. And Louie adored his brother. He made us bring him to the hospital every day until we could take Danny home. He would beg to feed Danny, hold him. He even helped bath him and change him. Danny was his baby.

When they got older, Louie was always protecting Danny. Wouldn't let his baby brother cross the street alone. At the playground, at school. No one dared to pick on Danny, no matter how scrawny he was. You didn't mess with Louie's little brother."

"Did you know that Louie was a Tanglewood boy?"

"Yeah. Danny was about fourteen. Louie wasn't a smart kid like Danny. He knew it, figured it was the only way he could make something out of himself. He stopped hanging around with baby brother. Danny would nag him to play ball, go see a movie. Hang out like the old days. Then one day, couple of years later, Louie shows up at the house. Danny had just gotten his license so Louie tole him they could go for a ride in his car. He and the Boys were going to drive down to Atlantic City for the weekend. It was summer so I let Danny go."

"You trusted Louie to look after Danny, like when they were kids."

"And then Danny shows up back home a couple of hours later with a bruise on his face, talking about Louie telling him to go home. I didn't push him on it. Next week, Louie calls, tells Danny he's sorry for hitting him. But things were never the same between them."

Mac jumped when his phone beeped. There was a text message from Danny. 911.

"Something's wrong." Mac said, heading for the elevator.

They got back to Louie's room to find it filled with doctors and nurses. Danny and his mother were watching, their eyes full of panic.


	4. The hardest choice

There was a strained silence in the room as they watched the macabre spectacle.

Finally, after an eternity, one figure broke away from the activity and came out of the room.

"Mr and Mrs Messer." The doctor said solemnly. Mac knew it was his cue to step away. Give the family their privacy. He moved off to the far side of the room.

"What's going on with our son?" Mr Messer asked.

"I'm sorry, but your son's heart stop. We've given him drugs, used CPR and electric shocks but so far nothing is working."

"What do you do now?"

"We have two options. The first is that we open up his chest, try internal simulation. Sometimes it will work. Or --"

"Let him die." Danny spoke up.

"That is the other option."

"No. I mean you should let him die."

"Danny." His mother looked at him, shocked. "What are you saying?"

"They beat him up so bad he stopped breathing on the scene. He did it again in the surgery. He's in a coma that the doctors didn't think he was going to come out of before this. Now he's been almost half an hour without oxygen to his brain. That means the chances of his waking up are even worse.

"Louie spent the last 15 years living with the guilt of having done nothing. He didn't stop Sonny from beating up that kid, from killing him. Because he did nothing, at least one other kid died. And then when Salvador couldn't take at any longer, I almost got hurt. And you know Louie, his first rule was no one messes with his kid brother. It wasn't enough for him to just talk. He had to do something. To make up for not doing anything before. That's the way Louie thinks. He caused the problem, it was up to him to fix it. So he did. He knew the risks but he did it anyway. Because it was what he felt like he had to do." Danny looked at his parents, his eyes pleading. "Louie wouldn't want to spend the rest of his life in a hospital bed hooked up to some machine being a burden. That would kill his soul."

"There's no chance he could pull through." His father asked the doctor.

"I can't say there is absolutely no chance but it's very, very slim. One in a million odds."

"And the chances of his heart starting."

"Given the damage to the muscle from the attack and the previous arrests, also very slim."

"Dad," Danny begged his father. "He's been beaten up enough."

They knew Danny was right. Mac could see it in their eyes. But he could also see the pain. Especially for Danny. Louie had acted to save him. It was unlikely that a jury would have convicted Danny of murder. They had enough evidence to suggest reasonable doubt. But IA would have had a field day with the implications and Danny would have certainly been chained to a desk for the rest of his career, if not outright fired. And that, to borrow Danny's words, would have killed his soul. And Louie knew his brother enough to know that. Sonny Sassone and that night had ruined his relationship with his brother, Louie wasn't going to let it ruin Danny's life. Even if it cost him his own.

Mac watched as Danny's father merely nodded to the doctor who returned to the room. A moment later, all activity stopped. It took only seconds for the squeal of the alarm to start. Mac could see the doctor look at the clock, see him mouthing the words "time of death". A nurse reached over and turned off the alarms.

Danny's parents hugged one another. Danny, his face pale, slipped out of the room and into the bathroom at the end of the hall. Mac followed and found him standing in front of a sink.

"Is that what it was like?" Danny turned on the water and splashed water on his face.

"What what was like?" Mac handed him a paper towel.

"When your wife died. Is that what you had to do?"

"More or less."

"Was it hard, making that choice?"

"It was the hardest choice I've ever made."

They walked back out into the hall. Danny stopped outside the waiting room and looked outside. "You can see the stars. Louie would have loved that. He had a thing about the stars."

Mac looked up at the twinkling stars. "The first case Stella and I ever worked together we were processing a roof. As we were packing up our kits, she starts talking about how the stars were out. Says that in the old Greek stories, when a hero died, the gods would pin his body up in the sky so the people wouldn't forget about him and his deeds." He pointed out the window. "You see those stars."

Danny tried to follow his finger. "Which ones?"

"Right there. Looks like a fist with a finger pointing up. I think that that's Louie, hanging up in the stars, giving it to all the Sonny Sassone's of the world. His own little way of telling them that one day they will get what's coming to them."

Danny gave Mac a look like he'd totally lost it. "Anyone ever tell you that you are one strange guy." He glanced out the window and gave a chuckle. "Still I do like the thought. Stupid as it sounds." He laughed.

Mac nodded. It was a tiny return of the Danny he knew. It was good enough for now.

"I'll have your badge and gun waiting for when you're ready for them."

"Thanks, Mac."


	5. Epilogue

"Knock, knock"

Mac turned away from his computer to find Danny leaning into his office.

"Rumor has it you got something of mine." Danny said with a grin. "May I please have it back?"

Mac smiled. "I don't have it. The duty captain does."

"Well, then let's go gang up on him and get it back." Danny said with a tinge of impatient. He knew Mac was indulging in some light teasing, taking his time saving the report he was working on, securing his computer, sliding on his suit jacket.

They walked down the hall in silence. Conversations stopped as they went by, people stopped to look. Danny acted as if he didn't notice the glances, hear the whispers.

A half hour later they were walking out with the reinstatement paper work signed and filed and Danny's badge and gun back on their rightful home on his hip.

"You could have taken a few days off. You had the time coming."

"Louie wouldn't have wanted me to wallow. That wasn't tough." Danny said with an 'end of conversation' tone to his voice.

"Hey Danny." Lindsay smiled as they walked into the lab. "It was a beautiful service."

"Thank you for the flowers. My mother loved them."

"Danny." Sheldon nodded from his microscope.

"Hawkes."

"Danny. You're back." Stella walked in. She gave his shoulder a squeeze. "Are you okay?"

"I. Am. Fine." He said just loud enough for everyone in the lab to hear it. And Mac knew it wasn't just Danny trying to be the tough Bronx guy. He meant it. He was with family and he was going to be okay.

"Well if you need anything."

"You know what I need. I need a case. Something nice and messy."

Stella laughed. "Then you have come to the right place." She turned to Mac. "Dispatch just called. Flack and Maka are on the scene of a shootout. Looks like a couple of gang bangers went "all Wild West on each other" according to Flack. Killed each other and a third party, woman, probably a girlfriend. Plus there's a mystery blood trail without a victim."

"Now that's what I'm talking about." Danny laughed, already half way across the room to retrieve his kit.


End file.
